In China They Eat Dogs

Alamo on Demand Exclusive!

The 90s were an exciting time in genre filmmaking. Quentin Tarantino rewrote the rules with PULP FICTION while Guy Ritchie was shaking things up in the UK with LOCK, STOCK, AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS. Although far lesser-known internationally today, Lasse Spang Olsen and Anders Thomas Jensen at the same time were reinventing in their own distinctly Scandinavian fashion with the smash action-comedy sensation IN CHINA THEY EAT DOGS.

Arvid (Dejan Cukie) is a bank teller whose life has fallen into a rut – so deep a rut that his girlfriend, Henne (Trine Dyrholm), breaks up with him for being too dull. Hoping to put some much-needed adventure into his life, Arvid helps stop a robbery at the bank by bashing would-be thief Franz (Peter Gantzler) over the head with a squash racquet. At first, Arvid is proud of his accomplishment, but Franz’s wife, Astrid (Line Kruse), tracks him down and tells him a dubious story about how Franz was robbing the bank only so he could pay for medical treatments that would allow the couple to have a child.

Imagining he can help out Franz and Astrid and prove himself more interesting to his girlfriend, Arvid plots his own robbery and enlists his potentially psychotic brother Harold (Kim Bodnia) to help out. But crime is not exactly second nature to Arvid and his crew, and soon they find themselves on the run from the Yugoslavian mafia.

Irreverent, wild, fast-paced and truly unique, IN CHINA THEY EAT DOGS was a box office smash in Denmark. Lasse Spang Olsen continued as be Denmark’s premiere stunt coordinator and Anders Thomas Jensen has been immensely prolific writer both in Denmark and now in Hollywood. But there is something quite special about this, one of their early collaboration.

We are proud and excited to share the newly restored IN CHINA THEY EAT DOGS exclusively with you on Alamo on Demand. (Tim League)